What To Watch For When Patriots Host Seahawks On Sunday Night
By Michael Hurley, CBS Boston
BOSTON (CBS) -- For the 7-1 New England Patriots, Sunday night's home date with the Seattle Seahawks might as well be dubbed the Midseason Super Bowl.
No, the implications of the final score won't quite carry the same weight as it did the last time these two teams met, but for a Patriots team that sits atop the NFL and has an awfully soft schedule over the season's final seven weeks, a visit from the Seahawks in all likelihood represents the most significant test remaining between now and the postseason.
The Seahawks don't enter Sunday night as the fearsome squad perhaps imagined when this Week 10 meeting was circled in the offseason as the game of the year. They're 5-2-1, their offense has had serious issues, and they've struggled on the road. The Patriots enter the game as the better team on paper, but the game still stands as the team's toughest challenge since Week 1.
Here's where to keep an eye when the game kicks off Sunday night.
Hitting Brady In The Mouth
Tom Brady has been, for all intents and purposes, perfect this year. His 73.1 percent completion rate is by far the best in the NFL, as is his 133.9 passer rating. He's thrown 12 touchdowns and zero interceptions. He has, in short, defied logic.
But he's also done it against the teams that rank 32nd, 24th, 20th and 30th in the league in yards per pass attempt. Now, while the Seahawks defense might not be quite where it was in 2013 and '14, it's still pretty good.
The Seattle defense has allowed just six passing touchdowns all year, tied for second-fewest in the league. The Seahawks' 27 sacks has them ranked third in the NFL, and their 81.6 passer rating against ranks sixth in the league.
And while Brady's fourth-quarter performance (13-for-15, 124 yards, two touchdowns) in Super Bowl XLIX was the stuff of legend, the rest of his night was very much an up-and-down showing (24-for-35, 204 yards, two touchdowns, two interceptions). So it's not as if Brady owned them.
It will be interesting, then, to see if the Seattle defense may be the first unit to force Brady into making a mistake that could shape the game.
Even without Michael Bennett, the Seahawks present a number of challenges for Brady. Cliff Avril has been a force this season, with nine sacks and three forced fumbles, while Frank Clark has racked up 6.5 sacks of his own.
In the defensive backfield, Richard Sherman has three picks, Earl Thomas has two, and Bobby Wagner -- who picked off Brady in the Super Bowl -- has one as well.
If you want to get an idea of what the Patriots' offense might look like come playoff time, this (and the Week 15 trip to Denver) is your best chance. The Seahawks know that the offense depends on Brady, and they will be gunning for him every way they can.
Can Patriots' Defense Inspire Confidence?
The New England defense surrendered 21 second-half points to Ryan Tannehill, allowed Landry Jones to throw for 281 yards, and still ranks just 19th in the league on third-down defense. The points allowed remain low, but the flaws throughout the defense have been thoroughly dissected over the past eight weeks. Nit-picking? Sure, but the prevailing thought around these parts is that if the Patriots are to be a Super Bowl team, their defense is going to need to improve.
Well, now's a perfect time to show it.
The Seahawks convert third downs just 36.4 percent of the time, which ranks 24th in the NFL. They likewise rank 26th in yards per game and 23rd in points per game. They have almost no running game to speak of whatsoever. And though Russell Wilson has only been sacked 16 times, but he's been under fire behind that shaky offensive line all year long.
If this offense is able to do against the Patriots what it did last Monday night against the Bills, then the alarm bells will be ringing in New England. Add in the fact that the Seahawks are on a short week and have to travel across the country, and they're even more ripe to be susceptible to being held in check. Essentially, the Patriots' defense will be given a chance to prove it can put forth a shutdown showing. How they respond will be of some importance going forward.
The Graham Plan
Of course, if the Patriots are to stifle the Seahawks offensively, it'll likely begin and end with Jimmy Graham. The second-best tight end in the NFL has been on quite a roll this season, topping the 100-yard mark in three games and making a pair of incredible touchdown receptions last week.
Graham -- who stands at 6-foot-7, 265 pounds -- has always been a tough cover for opposing defenses, and the task will be the biggest challenge facing New England this Sunday.
It's likely that the bulk of the work is either split between Devin McCourty and Patrick Chung or that one of those two safeties spends much of the evening faced up with Graham. There's likely to be help from the corners, too, but if Graham is able to get his catches and yards in that intermediate area of the defense, you might begin to hear some people start to question whether a very strong, very fast linebacker like Jamie Collins might have been helpful in such a scenario.
Remember Me?
Sports are fascinating for a million different reasons. The psychology of the athletes is absolutely a big one.
So, when Russell Wilson stands in the shotgun, scans his options before the snap and sees No. 21 lined up on one of his receivers, it will be rather interesting to watch how the quarterback handles it.
Obviously, Wilson has moved on from the goal-line pick that cost him and his team a second straight Super Bowl victory. He's thrown 824 passes since that one, and just 13 have been picked off. At 27 years old and with a Super Bowl victory already under his belt, he doesn't have to worry about that one pass defining his entire career.
But still ... in many ways, there's no way to ever possibly get over that moment. Certainly, other athletes have crumbled when facing adversity in various forms, and so seeing Russell attack (or avoid) Malcolm Butler through the air will be a game within the game that -- no matter which way it goes -- will be worth watching.
People don't forget.
You can email Michael Hurley or find him on Twitter @michaelFhurley.
